This article first
appeared in the Journal of Chemical Education and was later reprinted
as part of RPI's Engineering and Science Series. It was authored
by one of Rensselaer's most distinguished faculty members, Professor
Henry (Hendrik) Sjoerd van Klooster.

Dr. Van Klooster studied
in Germany, Holland, and France from 1909 to 1915, after which
he worked as a chemist in Holland. In 1916 he relocated to the
United States to teach at Lafayette College. A year later he joined
the faculty at Rensselaer, where he taught chemistry until his
retirement in 1955. In addition to chemistry, he studied and taught
food analysis, colloid science and metallography. Van Klooster
authored over 100 books, articles, and reports, including many
on the history of chemistry.

Technical
Information

This article has been
converted to a searchable pdf format (22.5 MB), which requires
Adobe Acrobat Reader software and may take several minutes
to download. Click
on the binoculars icon on the menu bar to do a search.[Click
here to open the pdf file]